Supervisors often prefer rule breakers, up to a point
journals.aom.org178 points by rustoo 2 days ago
178 points by rustoo 2 days ago
Breaking rules by subordinates frees supervisors from properly delegating power (implies taking responsibility for the delegation) or changing the rules (again taking responsibility). It is a quite convenient stance - something works you win - it fails not your fault.
In any large organization, there are basically two classes of rules: 1) stupid red tape rules that slow everyone down and 2) really important rules that you can never break ever. Effective people learn which rules fall into which group so they can break the red tape rules and get more stuff done.
That's a rather binary view and I disagree that rules always fall in either category.
Knowing _why_ a rule exists and what it's trying to prevent/achieve is much more valuable in my opinion. Wether or not to follow or bend a rule depends so much on the context.
Your argument circles back to the posters point. Knowing which rule you can break at a specific point in time. Why are you being so anal about it?
I think it's a worthwhile addition to highlight there is 3) rules which are sometimes red tape and sometimes to be broken, on top of the other 2 categories. It adds on to the original point with the addition of how to universally discover what the categories are rather than prescribe them up front.
This study seems to be focused on breaking rules imposed on the organization by external entities, not rules the organization created independently to support its own objectives.
Supervisors aligned with an organization's goals likely often view such external rules with contempt. It's not surprising they tolerate or support rule breaking as long as they believe it won't be punished externally.
I disagree. I think it's more like the rules are there for a reason, but most of them can be broken if there is a good enough reason.
Fundamentally, rules almost always come with compromises — for the sake of making rules understandable by humans, they have to be relatively simple. Simple rules for complex situations will always forbid some amount of good behaviour, and allow some bad behaviour. Many of society's parasites live in the space of "allowable bad behaviour", but there is a lot of value to knowing how to exploit the "forbidden good behaviour" space.
The worst of all worlds is when a blind application of the rules results in bad behavior.
This situation seems to come up frequently, and I'm very often appalled at how readily otherwise normal people will "follow the rules" even when it's clearly and objectively bad, and there may even be existing pathways to seek exceptions.
Some types of people are “rule followers” are can’t fathom breaking any rules.
There are also “rule breakers” who can’t fathom being told what to do.
Both types of people are insufferable.
In law there is the concept of "rules VS. Standards" which seems to relate to what you explain.
Example?
Going 10mph over the speed limit on a highway, especially because you’re a little late, isn’t a big deal.
Going 5mph UNDER in a neighborhood with kids playing around on the street is too fast.
A classical example of legal bad behaviour is that of patent trolls.
For which side?
Most examples boil down to common sense. Nobody is going to arrest a 14 year old for driving their dying parent to the hospital.
Similarly, it is reprehensible but legal to pull up a chair and watch a child drown in a pool.
There is a difference between law and morality, and humans will use the second to selectively enforce the former.
> Similarly, it is reprehensible but legal to pull up a chair and watch a child drown in a pool.
In which country? Even for the US I don't believe the law system is that crappy.
> In which country? Even for the US I don't believe the law system is that crappy.
There's video from a few years back that shows very American cops standing outside a burning house at night, knowing there was a young child still in it. A passing pizza delivery dude[1] rescued the 6-year old, handed her to cop, and ended up requiring hospitalization. In the online discussion, everyone called the rescuer a hero, but I don't recall seeing a single condemnation of the cops (a "first-responder") who didn't enter the burning house.
edit: 1. the hero's name is Nick Bostic https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBlE52qKKuw
It gets tricky when professions, insurance etc are involved.
Example: After a missile attack on a Dnipro gas station in 2022, my wife and her team arrived to see the station burning and 3 people already confirmed dead, but the paramedics would not go inside (they actually weren't allowed to, due to the danger). Her team was military, however, so it was OK to go in and check for survivors.
A burning house is not "a pool".
In my country you can't watch a kid drowning in a pool* but you are not obligated to help anyone in a burning house, since that would put you in danger too. I assume it is the same ~everywhere in the world, including the US.
* assume rescuing would be fairly safe, you are a good swimmer, you have lifeguard education, the weather is nice and the kid is small. AFAIK rescuing drowning people is dangerous as they can pull you down.
A drowning child is of fairly limited threat to an even halfway competent adult swimmer. Even at maximum panic/flailing, they just don't have the mass or strength to prevent you from at least treading water.
I'm a good swimmer, and 50 pounds of thrashing, scratching and climbing feels dangerous.
It is a very clear difference, if you need to bring yourself into danger (enter a burning house) vs just looking it drown in a pool.
Cops have no legal obligation in the US to protect people from crime. They can watch you be mugged without lifting a finger. They might be fired, but the victim isn't entitled to protection.
It basically comes down to positive and negative rights. Someone is at fault if they harm you, but nobody is required to help you, even the government.
If police had a legal obligation to protect people from crime, everyone would have recourse if the police failed to protect them. Bar fight? Sue the police. Domestic violence? Sue the police.
It would literally lead to the collapse of the justice system.
Really? You don't think there is a middle ground? Are the cops watching this fight or hearing about or later?
> nobody is required to help you, even the government
Seems very convenient, what am I paying taxes for then?
You're paying taxes because your government forces you to under threat of violence.
>[...] but the victim isn't entitled to protection.
Which is the my point. If cops don't have an obligation to save anyone from a fire, then why would random Joe get into trouble for similar inaction. GP was mistaken about the laws in America.
Indeed, we are in agreement. they were in disbelief responding to my parent post.
The problem is, as always, insurance. Entering an unsafe building in an employment context without adequate PPE will kill off any claims for workplace injury. The pizza driver however will most likely be covered by some kind of government scheme, because him getting injured is not tied to his employment.
It's the same why store clerks are explicitly banned from intervening with thefts or fights among unruly customers. When they get injured because they willfully entered a fight, they have zero claims to make (other than trying to sue a piss poor drug addict, which is pointless) - only a security guard is insured against that.
But there was a fire, so the risk of themselves dying was pretty high! There is a reason why they get extra, literal medals if they go above and beyond. Hell, there are situations in which even firefighters would not go easily.
I think you'll never find a case where someone got in trouble for not being a hero. I've recently found myself in a somewhat related situation where a guy turned violent in a pub... first I tried to calm him down and almost got hit... he then turned to other guys who were nearby, and one of them got punched in the face and fell unconscious. My family was with me and told me to stay the hell out of it, but I thought that would be extremely cowardly so I jumped at the guy to try to keep him down, but he was strong and I got a punch in the eye which cost me a week with a black eye, but could've easily turned out much worse for me. If I had just stayed quiet, would I be "negligent"?? The police told me what I did was good as I was trying to help someone, but I didn't have any obligation to do it.
In the case of a child in a pool, the difference is a matter of degree. What if I am terrified of water myself? Does that justify my inaction? What if I just "froze", which is common in stressful situations. Does anything justify not doing something?
Here in Finland, there is legal obligation to help people in emergencies, but this does not mean that you are required to danger yourself or act beyond your abilities. So usually only thing you are actually legally required to do is to call for help.
Are you legally required to carry a means of communication? If not, how can this possibly be enforced? It sounds like an end run to get to negligence charges.
For example, how fast can I drive to get to a telephone if I don't carry one or otherwise cannot use it?
> Are you legally required to carry a means of communication? If not, how can this possibly be enforced?
Obviously not... If you have no means to communicate you are not required to communicate. I don't know why you'd think otherwise.
> For example, how fast can I drive to get to a telephone if I don't carry one or otherwise cannot use it?
This would obviously depend on circumstances and how safe you're able to drive without causing more incidents.
This is also why we have courts, and judges, and juries. They look at the totality of circumstances and arrive at judgement.
There's a discussion of the difference between American and German tort law here: https://supreme.findlaw.com/legal-commentary/how-germany-vie...
The difference is that German law is more systematic and includes a general duty to rescue, but this doesn't result in excessive negligence charges, as awards are much smaller.
> It sounds like an end run to get to negligence charges.
It's not anything nefarious like that. US citizens and US law enforcement tend to have an adversarial relationship, unfortunately. Finns generally do not. That law is an expression of expectation for behavior in a civilized society, not an opportunity for prosecutorial promotion, as it might be in the US. One must take reasonable steps to save a drowning child, including calling police. In practice, only the most egregiously callous psychopathic misbehavior is punished. Honestly, who doesn't think that a person shouldn't be in jail who would prefer to film and giggle while a child was drowning? A person like that needs a timeout at least.
> Honestly, who doesn't think that a person shouldn't be in jail who would prefer to film and giggle while a child was drowning? A person like that needs a timeout at least.
The difference is that jail in the US is not "timeout". Prisoners may be required to work against their will, which is the carve out in the fourteenth amendment which abolished slavery. People openly joke about sexual assault in prison with derogatory comments like "don't drop the soap". All in all, I think the bar should be higher to send someone to prison in the US. We already have too many people in prison and, in my opinion, many of them are wrongly in prison.
> I think you'll never find a case where someone got in trouble for not being a hero
Very much depends on country: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duty_to_rescue
In France at least, and I believe in the US to, it is illegal to not do something if you can.
It does not mean that you should dive and bring him back. In fact, it is not recommended unless you know what you are doing as you may put yourself in danger and need rescuing yourself. But if there are other people around who can help and you don't alert them, or if you have a working phone and don't call whatever emergency number is appropriate, than that's illegal.
EDIT: It appears that it is not illegal do do nothing in most of the US. The law only protects you from consequences of trying to help.
It depends what you mean by do. In the US, if you didn't notify police or call for help and just stood and watched while someone died, no jury would pass on convicting you. You're expected to behave reasonably. There need not be a written law. It's called common law.
Unless you are the parent, legal guardian, or someone with some other special legal duty to the child where this might be criminal neglect, yes, this is legal in, AFAIK, every US legal jurisdiction — there is no general legal duty to render aid.
In Germany it is different.
- failure to render assistance ("unterlassene Hilfeleistung") up to one year in prison or a fine
- Exposed to a life-threatening situation ("Aussetzung", § 221 StGB) – If a person leaves someone helpless in a life-threatening situation, they could be sentenced to up to 10 years in prison
Edit: Also note that murder would often give you 16 years in germany even though it is called live long.
I suppose it would depend a lot on the specifics of the situation, but there's less obligation to help others than I would have thought:
> Even for the US I don't believe the law system is that crappy.
Then you're living in a fantasy world.
The law is not indented as a one stop shop for instructions for life or how to be a good person.
The law serves to stop people from damaging each other, not make them help each other.
Most of common law is based on the premise you dont owe anyone anything but to be left alone.
Not the poster, but some examples;
- emotional support animals - take a penny, leave a penny - ‘discretion’ and speed limits - qualified immunity
> While incompetence is merely a barrier to further promotion, "super-incompetence" is grounds for dismissal, as is "super-competence". In both cases, "they tend to disrupt the hierarchy." One specific example of a super-competent employee is a teacher of children with special needs: they were so effective at educating the children that, after a year, they exceeded all expectations at reading and arithmetic, but the teacher was still fired because they had neglected to devote enough time to bead-stringing and finger-painting.
> ...a teacher of children with special needs...fired...
Note that that example is from (at latest) the 1960's. These days, at least in better-off areas, the parents of the affected special needs kids would likely make life hell for the School Board behind that firing.
More generally: If your super-competence is highly beneficial to some folks further up the pecking order, that often takes precedence.
Here's the dangerous way I put it that I only tell senior people: understand why rules were made and make sure the people who made them would be happy.
I saw this put really, really well not too long ago:
> A lot of us got the message earlier in life that we had to wait for other's permission or encouragement to do things, when in fact, all you need is the ability to understand the situation and deal with the consequences
So fun to see other variations of this. I have for a while said
> You never need permission to do a good job.
But of course, it takes the experience to understand the nuances of what a good job is in the domain at hand, in the organisation and society at hand.
> You never need permission to do a good job.
If you don't mind, I will steal this one.
I’m sure there’s a flashy way to say it, but yours reminds me of this one:
> Only ask for permission if you want to be told “no”
The one I'm familiar with is:
> It's better to ask for forgiveness than permission.
Of course this can be used to justify all sorts of terrible things, but I've mainly seen it as pretty innocent in work environments when applying common sense.
As a manager the way I approach rules with my reports is I always tell them to understand the "chesterton's fence" behind any rule. I looks at rules like business logic in code, the "logic" was added there for a reason but there are often edge cases where that logic does not apply. I don't tell my reports to either break or follow any particular rule, but to understand why that rule is there before they decide if they need to either follow or break it.
And from personal experience i find that when you give people that level of autonomy, they will almost always approach what I told them about rule breaking in good faith.
> Here's the dangerous way I put it that I only tell senior people: understand why rules were made and make sure the people who made them would be happy.
If you aren't absolutely sure those senior people know what they're doing, the this is a great way to end up with originalism.
Frankly, most corporations do not last long enough for this to be a problem. Governments are their own issue, but without the political inertia and staying power of a nation-state, your organization will likely be long dead (or at least irrelevant and dying) before interpretations will drift that far. Most of the time, for most engineers, at least some of the people who made these rules in the first place are still around -- which helps ensure that nothing drifts too too far.
Of course there are exceptions, probably even upwards of 20% of the time, but we're talking generalities.
As a supervisor I didn’t resonate with this until I remembered in some jobs I have communicated the company attendance policy but didn’t enforce it unless someone was a poor performer. I trust adults to manage their own time until they give me a reason to believe otherwise.
For my part, I’d rather trust people’s judgment and intrinsic motivation than enforce the rules. Enforcement is annoying, tedious, and distracting to my mission. However once I decide their judgement can’t be trusted I use rules to extrinsically motivate them.
And while this works for you, labor and employment attorneys use your non-standard application of the rules as a way to win lawsuits when brought against the company. Another way we end up with annoying, tedious, and distracting compliance (U.S. based take here).
I can't work under more than three layers of management, largely because I've found that to be the practical maximum of managers who will care more about my results than whether I'm following the inefficient set of rules laid down when the target results were different.
I don't think this is a problem, exactly. It just means I'm the kind of person who works much better in startups than mega corps. I can't not notice all the ways poorly made rules get in the way of getting things done, but once we hit the fourth layer of management, at least one of them WILL be the kind of manager who has gotten ahead in their career by writing and enforcing rules.
All that means is that the company has grown to the point that it's time for me to move on to the next project.
(And before anybody asks, of course there are some rules that are incredibly important. Many of them are codified as laws. Most of the rest would bring down the company. If I'm not willing to work within those rules, the company is the wrong fit for me from the start, regardless of size.)
The paper raises important concerns about the social impacts of large language models. However, it fails to acknowledge the significant work being done to mitigate risks and align AI systems with human values. Continued research and responsible development practices will be critical as these technologies advance.
A more palatable phrasing, "supervisors prefer people that engage with the rules with purpose." That is, choosing to break a rule because you are making a cost call based on what you were able to achieve is not, necessarily, a bad thing.
The "point" where this fails, of course, is where the "cost" call above is such that the supervisor can't agree.
Sometimes, the goal is to create an environment where people must break certain rules to get anything done, which everyone (including supervisors) understands, but by way of imposing those rules responsibility and liability is transferred to subordinates.
I think those environments are bad, most likely? Why would it be a goal to make it so that people break rules?
Making people think about the rules? That is fine and good. Setting them to be broken, though? That just sounds broken.
Like anything it's a balance.
On one extreme you have crap like the gig economy where workers have all of the responsibility and none of the control.
On the other extreme you have perverse workplaces where there would otherwise be no individual responsibility for work if people were not taking on that responsibility by working outside the rules.
I do think that having the system and the rules support the way the organization actually runs in reality is better than even a good implementation of systematic rule breaking.
The use of private internet access for work is denied. Doing so, shifts all responsibility from the IT-department on the private citizen. The WiFi is currently out of service.
You sound like a supervisor there ;)
“They didn’t break the rule! They engaged in the rules with purpose unlike those rule followers.”
Though I’m not advocating your approach is incorrect.
Someone who follows the rule even when it produces a terrible outcome is a painful liability. Just like someone who breaks the rule to do the same thing.
> Someone who follows the rule even when it produces a terrible outcome is a painful liability.
It is called malicious compliance for a reason.
> “Rule breaking appears to signal a team member’s commitment—a willingness to do whatever it takes to get the job done,” wrote Wakeman, Yang, and Moore, all of whom are hockey fans.
Beyond "taking one for the team", in business, I didn't see the article make some key distinctions:
* What is the origin of the rules? (Originated in the interests of the organization, or came from outside, such as regulatory requirements.)
* How much does the organization care about the rules? (Some rules they just need to make a paper trail show of effort, and worst impact is a transactional cost-of-business fine, or an unflattering news cycle. Other rule violations could dethrone a CEO, or even send them to prison.)
* Would the organization actually love to get away with violating that rule, when the right individual comes along to execute it without getting caught? (Say, some very lucrative financial scheme that's disallowed by regulations.)
* How aligned is the manager with the organization wrt the rules in question? (Say, the company actually really doesn't want people to violate this one rule, but a manager gets bonuses and promotions when their reports have the advantage of breaking the rule.)
Depending on those answers, a manager's claim of "Doing what it takes to get the job done!" can sound very different.
Anecdotally I’ve heard from professional athletes that steroid use is actually liked by coaches because it gives them better control over the locker room. If someone becomes an issue in the locker room, guess who is getting randomly selected for testing without a heads up warning.
Similar thinking applies in other fields as well I am sure.
yep, the concept is more general than steroids and often goes by terms like "blackmail" or "leverage"
The important thing is to know fundamentally "why" a rule exists and what goal / organizational objective it's existence and constraints provides. Then breaking it can be productive if it meets the same ends. This usually puts the rule breaker at conflict with people in the organization who put adherence to process higher in priority than the actual organizational goals.
Hard to see the negatives. Rule breakers allow you to reap the rewards while removing liability.
Every supervisor ever: Look my team is just an awesome team that achieves all goals by breaking rules. I was the fearless leader to lead them.
Same supervisor when caught breaking rules: Rogue employee. Nothing to do with me. Will fire them.
Good point. Though if they change the rules after breaking them, will history remember?
Looking at uber, any number of social media companies, etc., having some good lobbyists works wonders.
As one of my friends used to joke: "rules are for other people".
I live in a place that loves rules (Germany) and I come from one (Netherlands) that has people like I just quoted taking a more relaxed attitude to rules. Being pragmatic about rules and not placing blind trust in them is key to being able to adapt to changing circumstances.
Germany is having a hard time adjusting to modern times. It's something that's being complained about a lot in the country. The topic of "Digitization" (capitalized, because that's a German grammar rule) has been a topic in elections for the last 20 years or so. They can't do it. There are rules that say that only paper signatures are valid. Never mind that this rule has been challenged, relaxed, etc. They stubbornly revert to doing everything on paper. It's infuriatingly stupid. You get this whole ritual of people printing paper, handing out copies, and insisting it's all done in person. I get plenty of docusign documents to sign as well these days. So I know that this perfectly acceptable. For official documents for the tax office even (via my accountant). It's fine. This rule no longer applies. But try explaining that to Germans.
Breaking rules when they stop making sense and don't apply to changed circumstances is a sign of intelligence. Supervisors can't foresee all circumstances and they like people that can think for themselves that can adjust and follow the spirit of the rule rather than the letter of the rule.
"We found that when people broke the rules, teams were less likely to win games."
This seems like a prima facie bad conclusion to their hockey study, considering that the Panthers won the cup while being effectively tied for the lead in penalty minutes, with #3 not being particularly close. Yes there's a weak correlation between penalties and losing, but considering that the absolute best teams usually have a high rat index, there's a big lost opportunity to go into the rat factor in hockey and how it translates to the corporate world!
They prefer rule breakers because rigidly following the rules means things won't get done on time in almost all cases.
If I have to make a rule, it's to prevent the worst people from doing the worst things. If I have an opportunity to use my judgement and you are neither doing the worst thing or someone I consider the worst person, there's bound to be wiggle room.
This study is about the NHL, hardly applicable to other contexts.
Next time you get too many story points assigned on a sprint, cross-check your manager.
I’ve kinda done this at different points. Sometimes people need a good stern talking to out of band.
Spending some time in the box for 'snowing that hot-headed coworker' doesn't sound so bad.
Four minutes for roughing after you punch somebody in the face? Sign me up!
>> Four minutes for roughing
I've never seen a double minor for roughing. 2 minute minor or 5 minute major.
4 minute double minor is typically when someone is high sticked and they're bleeding because of it.
So yeah, give a co-worker a hand to the face and if the manager catches it you're sitting out of the sprint planning meeting for either 2 or 5 minutes depending.
> I've never seen a double minor for roughing. 2 minute minor or 5 minute major
I've seen a double minor for roughing when both players involved get the roughing minor but one player gets the double for instigating
> if the manager catches it you're sitting out of the sprint planning meeting for either 2 or 5 minutes depending.
Going to be a lot of sore faces when this rule comes into effect.
How so? The study is about leadership, decision making, and risk vs reward. Is there not demonstrable (and multiple levels of) leadership within sports teams?
I'm genuinely curious if you've participated in collegiate above sports - or at maybe even High School level. I would be very surprised if someone who played or participated seriously in sports said they didn't take away lessons about leadership and decision making.
I’m sure they did take away lessons. Are those lessons applicable to the real world is the salient question.
"Sports does not occur in the real world"
That's a new one for me today.
Rule breaking is part of the game in sports. Players will, for example, take a penalty if it is worth it. Hockey has fights, basketball has fouls as a resource that gets expended over the course of the game.
Are you saying irl people don’t break the law or go against other conventions when they think it’s worth it?
It’s just a game, so there’s no real moral component and the stakes are much lower generally.
I can easily make a case that professional sports at the highest level (NHL, NBA, PL, etc) are much higher stakes than most peoples' jobs at least in $ dimension
Sure, but the pretense is that the game is a self contained reality and once the game is over, everyone has a life they can go on living. Tripping someone on the way to scoring a goal is _unfair_, and there is a defined penalty for it, but when the game is over, that's the end of the consequences for it.
There are, though, lots of penalties in hockey that are about not hurting or maiming (or even killing) people, and those sorts of penalties are very much not rewarded or encouraged by coaches or players.